New register for donors and offspring launched

People conceived from donated embryos, sperm or eggs will have the chance to find out about their genetic origins with a new register introduced today.

The Human Assisted Reproductive Technology (Hart) Register will record all future donations at fertility clinics which result in a birth, and information about earlier donors and births.

It will allow future donors and their offspring to find out about each other, and will also give people involved in earlier donor treatments the chance to do the same if they all give consent.

The registrar-general of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Brian Clarke, said the more people who provided information for the register -- whether donors, offspring or guardians -- the greater the chances that donors and donor offspring could be linked together.

"The Hart Register aims to give people who were donor-conceived the opportunity to find out about their donors, and also allow donors to find out about the people who were conceived with the assistance of their donation."

Providing information for the register is free, but some fees apply to access the information.

Mr Clarke said access to information on the register would be "carefully controlled".

"The information will only be available to those people to whom it relates, and to medical professionals if the information is required for providing medical treatment or advice," he said.

Births, Deaths and Marriages will also receive basic data from fertility clinics on donors, offspring and guardians for any donations made from today onward that result in a birth.

Fertility clinics will continue to hold more detailed information about these people for up to 50 years.

Associate Justice Minister Marian Hobbs said the Hart Act, which fully came into effect today, would guarantee people had access to information about their genetic background, and ensure that new human reproduction procedures and associated research were "subject to rigorous scrutiny".

Since November 2004, the act has prohibited such activities as cloning of human embryos for reproductive purposes and the implantation of a human embryo in an animal, or vice versa.

The act also outlaws the commercialisation of surrogacy, embryos and gametes (sperm and eggs).

"The area of human reproductive research and fertility treatment is a rapidly changing one and I am confident the new act places New Zealand in a position to keep pace with those changes while ensuring that decisions made are consistent with the values of New Zealanders," Ms Hobbs said.

- NZPA